The present invention relates to a heel unit for ski bindings with automatic reset means.
Heel units with automatic reset are heel units in which, upon the safety release of the ski boot from the binding, the heel unit automatically arranges itself in the open position, ready for a new coupling to the ski boot, both if release has occurred by means of the opening of the toe unit and if it has occurred by means of the opening of the heel unit.
Heel units with automatic reset, which were introduced some time ago, were based substantially on the concept that the heel unit, when the ski boot was no longer present on the binding, moved toward the front part of the ski, causing the rear jaw to open and to preset itself for a new coupling.
This type of solution has had few practical applications, because it was extremely difficult to calibrate the binding and undue openings of the rear jaw could occur due to the movement of the heel unit caused by the flexing of the ski or due to the incorrect adjustment of the adaptation of the binding to the length of the sole of the boot.
Heel units with automatic reset of the above described type were also structurally very complicated as well as scarcely reliable, due to the large number of component elements which constituted them.
Another problem which occurs in ski bindings is related to the timely actuation of the ski braking element upon the release of the boot from the binding; in order to solve this problem, the U.S. Pat. No. 4,168,083 describes a heel unit wherein the ski brake is actuated directly by the heel unit both if release from the binding has occurred due to opening on the toe unit and if it has occurred due to opening on the heel unit.
The embodiment described in the above mentioned patent, and specifically the embodiment illustrated in FIGS. 1 to 4, discloses an interaction between the rear jaw and the brake which causes the jaw to actuate the brake for any type of release but does not automatically open the rear jaw and does not reset it, if the release action has occurred due to the opening of the toe unit.